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Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Did your family throw a holiday party each year? Do you remember attending any holiday parties?

I don't recall my family throwing any holiday parties. The family of course got together on Christmas, but I'll talk about that more when we get to the gift memories.

I did attend a lot of holiday parties, particularly during my college years, and for a few years after. I went to an all-girls Catholic high school and had a pretty close bunch of friends. The Christmas season was a good time for get-togethers, and I think someone had a New Year's Eve or New Year's Day party every year.

The photo to the right is from a party at my parents' house in Houston, Texas on December 27, 1980, and that's me on the upper left. I had graduated from college two years before and was living in Corpus Christi at the time. Four years later, I had moved to the Seattle area, so no more of these parties. I miss them.

I've got a lot more holiday party group photos like that one or where I'm acting silly (I'm in the green shirt in the December 1978 party photo at the top of this post), but I've only included ones where you can see a Christmas tree in the background--to prove they're from holiday parties.

My undergraduate majors club (Recreation and Parks at Texas A&M University) also held a fancy Christmas party every December. Unlike most of our other social events, everyone was encouraged to dress up for these, and the girls often wore long skirts. To the left are the officers at the 1976 party - I was the reporter-historian that year and I'm at the lower left.

This was also the event where the "Silver Chaparral" award was given to the outstanding Fall graduate of the department. Guess who in December 1978->: